Promoting human rights is one of the explicit goals of EU trade policy. This was underlined by the EU Commissioner for Trade Karel De Gucht even before he took office, in a hearing before the European Parliament. According to Mr De Gucht, promoting human rights is an 'integral part' of his approach to trade policy. And indeed, since the mid-1990s, the EU has developed a systematic strategy and a sophisticated array of instruments to promote human rights in its trade policy. The main elements of this are human rights clauses in bilateral trade agreements, and comprehensive human rights criteria in the Generalised System of Preferences (GSP).

On the other hand, the effectiveness and credibility of the EU's approach to human rights in its trade policy is being called into considerable doubt by many developing countries and nongovernmental organisations (NGOs), as well as by UN human rights institutions. These criticisms are directed in the first instance at the narrow focus and arbitrary application of the aforementioned human rights instruments. Above all, though, the criticisms revolve around the almost exclusive orientation of the EU's own trade policy toward European economic interests, as reflected in the 'Trade, Growth and World Affairs' strategy and in the bilateral trade agreements.

In their proposal for world trade reform published in 2008 as part of the Ecofair Trade Dialogue – 'Slow Trade Sound Farming' – MISEREOR and the Heinrich Böll Foundation had already identified respect for human rights as a central principle. In light of the progress made in this debate, the Ecofair Trade Dialogue (Misereor, Heinrich Böll Foundation and Glopolis) and CIDSE are organising an expert seminar to discuss whether and to what extent the EU has lived up to its ambition and its legal obligation to promote human rights in trade policy and how human rights coherence can be improved.

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